


not if it's you

by aloeverava



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Fluff, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, KuroKen - Freeform, Kuroo is a little shit, M/M, but kenma loves him uwu, hospital bed cuddles, how does one tag consistently, kuroken oneshot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-24
Updated: 2020-06-24
Packaged: 2021-03-04 06:55:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,195
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24899527
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aloeverava/pseuds/aloeverava
Summary: “Hey, dumbass.”A breath leaves Kuroo in a huff—it’s supposed to be a laugh, but is cut short by the pain.“Only you would call me that as I lay dying,” Kuroo grins, dramatic as ever.Dialogue prompt #166: “I’ll take care of you.” - “It’s rotten work.” - “Not to me. Not if it’s you.”
Relationships: Kozume Kenma/Kuroo Tetsurou
Comments: 12
Kudos: 152
Collections: ☆彡 ask box fics





	not if it's you

**Author's Note:**

> warnings: brief description of injury, swearing

A sickening crack resounds throughout the gym and a hush falls over the Nekoma volleyball club. The sound of Kuroo’s body falling to the hardwood floor and a grunt of pain follow, though not nearly as deafening.

Somewhere on the other side of the court, the served volleyball hits the ground.

Yaku is closest to their captain, having been positioned in the back row, so he is the first to Kuroo’s side, kneeling next to his prone figure. The rest of the team—well, the rest of the team minus Kenma, who stands frozen on the other side of the net—follows suit immediately, crowding around their captain despite Coach Nekomata’s protests.

“Give him space, everyone! Lev, get the nurse—a medic— _ someone _ — I said to give him  _ space _ ,” And suddenly everyone has taken a step back. But it wasn’t a result of the coach’s words, rather, one blond boy.

The team parts like the red sea for their setter, who now takes slow but measured steps towards Kuroo. To anyone else, Kenma would look disinterested, apathetic, even. But the team knows him well enough to sense his worry, and that in itself tells just how dire the situation is.

As he treads closer, the muffled whimpers—Kuroo never  _ whimpered— _ become more audible, having been shielded by the mass of bodies surrounding him just prior. Now he is propped up on one elbow, clutching at the area just above his left ankle, which is red and bent at an angle Kenma is sure is unnatural.

“Fuck,” He hears the pain in Kuroo’s voice before he sees it in his eyes. He faintly wonders which would have been more unbearable. “Fuck, fuck, fuck,” The captain swears. Neither, Kenma decides.

Almost as if sensing his presence, Kuroo pries his eyes open, which were scrunched up in pain. Tears threaten to spill over; Kenma quickly swipes a thumb over the corner of his left eye. His actions are subtle, almost endearing. Really, Kenma just knows the older hates crying in front of his team.

“Hey, dumbass.”

A breath leaves Kuroo in a huff—it’s supposed to be a laugh, but is cut short by the pain.

“Only you would call me that as I lay dying,” Kuroo grins, dramatic as ever. Kenma is aware he’s trying to get an eye roll, another remark, anything out of Kenma, because the look on his face must be a strange one and he must be scaring his boyfriend.

But the pudding-haired boy’s gaze is glued on Kuroo’s ankle, which is twisted in a way it shouldn’t be able to do and scarlet and swelling bigger by the second.

“Eyes up here,” Kuroo says weakly. At this, Kenma does snort.

“...How bad is it?” Kenma takes a seat, legs slightly spread, and Kuroo automatically drops his body weight into the boy. Kenma doesn’t do much but just sit there so that Kuroo can have something to lean against, but it’s plenty enough for him.

“Fine! I’m just peachy,” The brunette grins. He’s clearly lying, though, by the way his breathing is labored and his heartbeat thumps erratically against Kenma’s own.

“No, you’re not. Don’t lie, I hate liars.” Kenma states simply. Outwardly, it might seem cold of him to be berating his injured boyfriend while he lies prone on the ground, but Kuroo knows it’s just his way of worrying. Still, he plays along.

“Imagine if those were your last words to—” Kuroo’s cheeky remark is cut off with the sound of an ambulance siren and the slam of the gym doors and Lev bursts through, two EMTs and a gurney following behind him.

“Awh, looks like I gotta go, kitten,” Kuroo smiles, leaning up to kiss his boyfriend. But instead of a goodbye peck, Kuroo yelps out in pain as he twists his body, putting pressure on the abused joint.

“God, you dipshit. Don’t move if it hurts,” Though his words are deadpan, the younger’s voice now just shows a hint of worry, something the team thought they’d never see.

“But I wanted a goodbye kiss,” Kuroo pouts.

“Stupid, I’m going with you.”

“Aww, my baby cares about me that much?” Kenma scrunches up his nose in disgust, but doesn’t reply as the EMT’s near.

“Sir, we need you to back away so we can get this young man onto the gurney,” One medic says, not unkindly, as the other blue-clad woman speaks softly to Kuroo, prodding his ankle gingerly. Kenma is already backing away, but a alarm flashes through his eyes when the other medic’s touch earns a hiss of pain out of Kuroo.

As if sensing his boyfriend’s worry, he throws a grin and a thumbs up behind him as he’s wheeled into the ambulance. Kenma quickly goes back to glaring. He doesn’t need to verbalize the “you dumbass” directed at the gurney-bound boy.

The EMT’s say something about having someone come with Kuroo, to which the rest of the team responds by looking at their setter expectantly. There isn’t any debate before Kenma is already halfway out the door, climbing into the ambulance after his idiot boyfriend.

“Aww, no flowers for me?” Kuroo, clad in a blue hospital gown and fresh out of surgery, is apparently fine with the way he’s already annoying his boyfriend.

“You’re allergic,” Comes Kenma’s reply as he settles into the chair beside the hospital bed. There’s the slightest indent between his eyebrows, the only noticeable sign of worry.

“Still, what kind of boyfriend are you if you don’t bring poor little me, who fractured his ankle, flowers?” Kuroo pouts, turning his body as much as he can to face Kenma. The younger subtly takes notice, seeing how it strains his neck to stay like that.

“Geez, how much of that pain medicine are you on if you think I’d bring you flowers?” The blond deadpans, getting up to grab a tissue. When he sits back down, he nudges the chair with his foot so that it is closer to Kuroo’s field of vision. The brunette’s body and eyes immediately track his movements, his body rotating to see his kitten better.

There, that’s better. Kenma can relax a little now, knowing that Kuroo can’t manage to hurt himself, bedbound as he is.

Still, Kenma is worried, even if he doesn’t admit it.

Kuroo lets out a long sigh, blowing a raspberry at the ceiling. Kenma raises an eyebrow, as if to say,  _ What now? _ Kuroo doesn’t even need to look at him to know.

“How long do you think I’ll be out of volleyball, Kenma?” His tone is light, but the scrunching of his features says otherwise to his emotional state.

“Do I look like a doctor?” At this, Kuroo sinks a little further into the pillows surrounding him, but he grins.

“Hmph… No, but you’d be a pretty sexy one,” Kuroo winks. Humor to cover up his true feelings, as always. Kenma only rolls his eyes, but feels a twinge of guilt. Despite not having quite the same love for volleyball the way Kuroo did, he didn’t want to imagine what being bedridden and unable to play for any longer than a week would be like. Complete agony, if he had to take a guess. No volleyball meant no Kuroo, which sounded… horrible.

“S’not like coach will kick you out of the gym,” Kenma offers. “You can watch practice. I guess.”

“Yeahhh, but what about while I’m in the hospital? The team needs me! I’m—”

“Tch. You need the team more than we need you, trust me.” Kuroo barks out a laugh, then winces the quaking of his body agitates his ankle.

“Aish, you’re so mean to me, baby,” Kenma only wrinkles his nose. Kuroo yawns, slightly adjusting himself in bed. WIth one leg elevated in a sling, it proves slightly difficult. Kenma almost gets up to help him.  _ Almost _ . Instead he’s rooted to his seat, trying to find the right words.

“...Tetsuro,”

“Yes?”

“You won’t be able to play for a while,” He says carefully. “But it isn’t like you’re not part of the team. You have me— us. You have us.”

For a moment, Kuroo stares in awe at his boyfriend. Kenma only blushes and pulls out his switch. He really needed to get back to animal crossing right about now.

When Kuroo doesn’t reply immediately, Kenma risks a glance in his direction. The motherfucker is grinning ear to ear.

Kenma expects a witty remark, but instead Kuroo simply sighs, “Thanks.”

The blonde only hums in reply, going back to his switch. Kuroo lets out a yawn, stretching his body out as best he can with one leg held up in the sling.

“Mm sleepy… G’night,” Kuroo murmurs, even though it’s three in the afternoon. “You gonna stay?”

“Mhm,” Kenma says, not looking up from his switch.

Soon the room is silent save for Kuroo’s (not so) soft snores and the quiet click, click, click of the buttons on Kenma’s switch.

Around the third hour, the screen goes dark abruptly. Kenma frowns, realizing he didn’t’ bring his charger, thinking that he wouldn’t be away from home for so long today.

Sighing, looks to Kuroo’s slumbering face. His features are relaxed, unguarded, but somehow, he seems to look smug with himself in his sleep. His mouth is slightly parted as the rumbling sound of his breathing escapes, drool starting to leak from the corner of his mouth.

Kenma is not so nicely reminded of the way Kuroo’s features had looked in stark contrast just hours ago, contorted in immense pain. Kenma thinks about how it was so strange and wrong and downright  _ hurtful  _ to see him suffer. The panic that had coursed through Kenma’s chest was undeniable, but the last traces of adrenaline were now leaving his bloodstream as he sat beside him, relaxed with Kuroo safe.

Kenma squirms in his chair, not used to sitting still for so long. Without his eyes and fingers engaged in a game or Kuroo’s witty banter to keep him entertained, sitting became just that—sitting. And with the day’s earlier events, he was feeling a strange urge to reassure himself of Kuroo’s safety. He didn’t like the sour feeling of worry that still echoed in his chest; he needed it gone.

Biting his lip, he eyes the bed. Kuroo is sleeping with his limbs sprawled like always, looking even more chaotic with one leg airborne and his hair. And of course, there’s a Kenma-shaped area of unoccupied bed—or at least, Kenma was confident he could make one.

Glancing towards the room’s door, which is slightly ajar, he debates his options. If he entertained the idea, he’d never hear the end of it from Kuroo. But sparing another glance towards the clock, he reconsiders. His ride wouldn’t be here for at least another two hours—it’d be impossible to just sit here for that long…

Oh, fuck it.

Kuroo has a puddle of drool collecting on his pillow. He thanks his stars—or God, or Buddha, just  _ someone— _ that his saliva isn’t dripping on the same side that the boy next to him clutches. He’d never forgive himself if he ruined that hair.

Trying his best not to disturb the sleeping figure curled up next to him, he thumbs away the drool and wipes his hand on the sheets. Kind of gross, but he’s put worse things onto his bedsheets before.

Cautiously, he turns onto his side to face Kenma. A wide smile splits his face as he gazes upon his boyfriend, who, quite frankly, looks no different than when he’s awake—which means he’s just as beautiful.

He was so used to waking up from naps with Kenma curled into his side, he almost doesn’t register that they’re squeezed into a hospital bed meant for one. He can’t help it—his heart busts a fat  _ uwu _ at the thought of his boyfriend climbing into bed with him to cuddle.

“Love you,” Kuroo whispers, pressing a kiss to the top of Kenma’s hair. He had to suppress the urge to whoop in joy when the boy nuzzles himself deeper into his side, letting out a purr-like sigh of contentment.

“Kenmaaaaaa.”

“What.”

“You’re already leaving?” Kuroo extends his arms, making  _ c’mere please _ hands and puppy dogs eyes that, frankly, only worked about half the time.

“Visiting hours ended a while ago, Kuroo. The only reason I’m still here is because the nurse thinks you’re cute,” He grumbles in reply. He’s already halfway to the door, his bag already slung over his shoulder.

“But who’s gonna take care of me?” 

“My ride’s here,” He states.

“Ugh,  _ fine _ , be that way!”

Kenma rolls his eyes. Better give him what he wants to hear now so he doesn’t hear it over the phone all night.

“I’ll take care of you,” He sighs. Kuroo’s smile is worth it. But dammit, does he like to be difficult.

“It’s rotten work,” He warns teasingly.

For the umpteenth time that day, Kenma rolls his eyes. Half-hoping Kuroo doesn’t hear, he mutters, “Not to me. Not if it’s you.”

Kenma hopes his boyfriend doesn’t catch sight of his blush before walking out the door.

**Author's Note:**

> look at meeeee  
> writing everything bUT my wips
> 
> anywho this is my second kuroken in a row and i regret nothing!!! nOTHiNg!!!
> 
> tumblr: hairbleachwhore  
> twitter: glutenfreeroach  
> ko-fi: aloeverava


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